I am Mayor Kerry, for those of you who I haven't met, and I am joined by Planning Director David Hiddle
and Council Member Sydney Zulek. I know you all have comfortable seats, and you came early just so you
could sit in the back. But I think because of the snow and the bitter cold outside, we probably are
going to be a small group. So if you would like to come closer, you're invited to do so.
TV here, and am I right that you're pulling sound from the speakers? Okay. So let me just give you a
rundown of how we usually do this. Some of you have been to town halls before, and some of you,
I don't think, have been to town halls before, so that makes my day.
We each will give you sort of a high level update of what we're working on, what we're seeing, what
we're hearing in the city based on the seats that we hold. And then we do a question and answer. And
I'm going to say in advance that we're going to target getting out of here by about 645 because we understand
that the weather is going to hit about 7. So we'll do a safety first.
and especially because there aren't too, too many people here to ask questions tonight. We'll target
645. I am happy to stay and talk to folks afterwards if you have lingering questions or ideas.
I want to start by thanking Director Schlegel from the Monroe County History Center here for hosting
us tonight. This is the first town hall we've done here. Really appreciate it. And so we're happy to
be downtown and in Councilmember Zulek's district. And before I hand things over to Councilmember Zulek,
I'll just note that
If you go out the door and turn left, there are restrooms down that way and a drinking fountain just
beyond that. So for your human needs, that's how you get to serve them. We have a small group here tonight.
So if you want to submit your questions more anonymously on note cards, we're happy to take the note
cards from you.
If you would like to ask a question, we'll take questions after we're done with sort of high level updates.
And we're just gonna ask you to use the microphone, even though everyone in here can hear you, the people
at home listening can't hear you unless you come through the speaker. So we're gonna, you'll have a
long walk if you stay in the back, but we're gonna have you use the mic and I'm gonna turn things over
to Council Member Zulek.
Thank you, Mayor Thompson. Everyone, Councilmember Sydney Zulek, I represent District 6, which for those
of you who don't know, starts at Walnut, goes all the way through campus from east to west, and then
north to south. It is 3rd to 17th Street. So I represent a lot of the downtown and almost all of campus,
which means that the makeup of my district is quite a lot of renters, mostly the younger demographic.
There is a small group of homeowners in the northwest portion of District 6, and then I do also represent
present quite a few small businesses that are trying to make it downtown. And so a lot of the work that
I do is related to economic development in the downtown area. If you've seen any of the beautiful new
traffic boxes downtown, that was a project that I worked on with Talisha Coppock, the executive director
for the convention center. And a lot of the other issues that we're all working on is affordable housing.
40,000 students.
plus in Bloomington, and I represent a large portion of them. Don't want to say majority, because I'm
not sure how it all shakes out. But yeah, the primary things that I work on are economic development
and affordable housing, and I am happy to answer any questions when we get to that section. Awesome.
David, do you want to go next? Sure. Looks like you do. Yeah.
Hi, I'm David Hiddle. I'm the director of the Department of Planning and Transportation. I've been here
for a little over a year and a half now. I held the same job in Lafayette prior to coming here. A few
of the things that we're working on, kind of some highlights. So some neighborhood or some initiatives
that I think are really interesting, kind of unusual and one-off activities are the Hope Well Planned
Unit development, which you may have heard of.
Hopewell, of course, is the former hospital site on the near southwest side, which is slated to become
a new neighborhood. Right now, what we're calling Hopewell South is the three southernmost blocks. And
we've enlisted an architecture and planning firm to help us realize a sort of a development that much
more closely matches what people are looking for in terms of housing. One of the really interesting facts
about Bloomington, and it actually stands nationally, is that it's either two-thirds or three-quarters.
But a vast majority of homes are occupied by either one or two people. A vast majority of houses that
are built in Bloomington, as is the case elsewhere, are more along the lines of the three-bedroom,
two-bathroom variety. So there's a lot of instances where you have a lot of house and not many people
living in them. So there's a real sort of a
break between reality and what's desired or what's needed by people. So in Hopewell, we're going to
be concentrating on much smaller houses, on much smaller lots built to accommodate today's family unit,
if you will. So you're not buying the extra two or three bedrooms. You're not buying the large yard
that most of the rest of the housing stock kind of forces you into if you want to be a homeowner. And
the idea is that this will serve as a pilot and hopefully
inspire other redevelopment opportunities around the city. So that's one of the big things we're working
on. It's just about to, it has its first design or development review committee meeting tomorrow, which
is kind of its first big public examination by the city. And then after that, it'll go to the
plan commission, eventually to the city council, where you'll be hearing quite a bit about it then.
But it's really
interesting and quite a bit different than anything else that exists in Bloomington, and we're hoping
it will sort of lead the way for a new way to look at how to develop efficiently a beautiful brand of
housing. So that's one of the things that we're working on. I think probably some of your questions
will lead to some of the other things we're working on. Awesome. So I'm Mayor Kerry and I am so excited
about Hope Well.
David gave you a great overview. I think one of the most exciting things about Hopewell is that we really
believe, we really are targeting trying to get these homes to be attainable for our young professionals,
which we're trying to keep in town. And that is, both Council Member Zulek and I have focused on economic
development.
that we really have a missing segment of our population. And those are the young professionals who they'll
stay maybe for a couple years after they
get out of IU, but then if we haven't kept them then, we can only hope to get them as bloomerangs usually
after they've raised a family. And so what we really want is to keep them and to make sure that there
is opportunity and potential here for them not only to be housed, there's a place that they can afford
to live and a place, hopefully, that is a neighborhood that really calls them into belonging and it's
a cool place to be right on
the beeline and walking distance to all of the downtown things and an asset like a grocery store right
across the trail, but also just really cultivate a culture of belonging there. And so Hopewall is not
exclusively for young professionals. We just want to make sure it's attainable for them. And on the
other side of that, we're working on jobs and how to grow our economic picture
so that our wages also grow in Bloomington. Because, of course, there are two sides of affordability.
One is how much your housing costs, right? And the other is how much do you make in order to be able
to afford that? And so we're really working on both ends of that. And a lot of my focus as mayor is
on those two areas, on housing and on economic development.
And my commitment is really looking at housing and at economic development in a way that really fits
for Bloomington, in a way that really leverages the assets we have here, of course, at the Research
One University, but we also have a lot of biofarm here. We have an incredible music scene here,
an art scene, and many other assets. And so I work really closely with what's happening at the Trades
District in generating some
startups here and growing smaller companies into mid-sized companies and also hopefully attracting some
mid-sized companies to relocate here in Bloomington. And then on the housing side, we have both Hopewell,
which is just extraordinarily exciting. The numbers in terms of affordability at Hopewell, and this
is without government subsidy.
The numbers are staggering. We believe that we will be able to provide a good percentage of the homes
at home ownership to folks who make 80% or below of the area median income. And that's just straight up no
no government subsidy. And so that's really an impressive feat. It has been my goal to be able to do
this. And as I've been in housing a long time, as I have looked at housing and what happens when we
put a lot of regulations and even more dreams, we stack like, we want this and this and this and this.
Those houses get more and more unaffordable.
And so the goal here is to build a beautiful neighborhood where people want to live, where there's something
for everyone, and that we keep it attainable, that people can actually afford to live there. And so
much thanks to David's leadership and Anna Killian Hansen, who's the director of HAND, Hopewell is really
getting there. We also have...
Of course, the homelessness challenges at hand these days, that has long been the story. I'm working
very closely with heading home, but also with our Bloomington team. We have nearly every department
that is touched by homelessness in some way. And I continue to work towards a plan where we can say
to everybody who's in our community, we have a place for you to sleep inside tonight.
And that's where we need to get. When you think of people sleeping outside tonight, you know that even if
We do keep people alive. They can't possibly be living a thriving life if they're spending so much of
their energy just trying to live. So we just published a 30-page, it's a whopper, but there is a little
summary, 30-page housing and homelessness report. There's a lot to digest there. We are very happy to
answer questions about that or connect the dots.
There's so much data that we tried to compress into a document that the public could understand, but
we're really happy to answer any questions about that report as time progresses and you take that for
multiple nights of bedtime reading to digest the whole thing.
I think we're ready to answer questions or hear what you would like to hear more about. You don't have
to frame it as a question. If you're interested in something that's happening in the city, just let
us know and one or all of us will talk about it for you. Yes, can you come up to the mic so people in
the polka dots, do you have a question? Yeah.
So if you're willing to state your name, come on up to the mic, because otherwise people watching at
home can't hear. Great. So I was just wondering if we could talk about the Bloomington Convention Center.
I got here a few minutes late, so you may have already touched on it, but I would love to hear what
everybody has to say about the various aspects of it. Do you have a particular curiosity, or do you
want general comments on the convention center?
Yes. Both. In particular, I'm thinking time frame. And what is the community doing to sort of celebrate
the opening? And then just sort of general update, yeah. Great. Do you want to go first? Do you want
me to go first? OK. Thank you. So the time frame question is, I believe we should have
doors open in June of 2027. So at that point there will be a 60,000 square foot expansion across the
street where the former early voting site used to be and then a 40,000
square foot which is where the current convention center currently sits and that will the remaining
money will go towards repairs that are needed in that building and as far as celebration I will let
Mayor Thompson speak to that but I hear that it can light up different colors and I am really hoping
they'll do it pink. I think the official celebrations probably haven't been planned yet we did a we
did a groundbreaking
Several months ago, and as you all can see, walking by or driving by, we've got verticality now. It's
coming out of the ground. So we all do our private celebrations about that. But I think we're targeting
that 2027 date. And I am sure we will get the party planned well ahead of that time.
I'll just share, you wanted sort of general comments. I'm really excited about the Convention Center
because we have been turning down a lot of convention business and many of the organizations here in
town have actually outgrown the Convention Center for their own events. And so it's something that we
both need here in town for our own organizations, nonprofits and businesses alike that are holding meetings
or fundraisers. But we also are really losing some tourist income. And we're the number two choice in
the state of Indiana for conventions. So people come into Indianapolis, it's, you know, they have a
huge convention center. You want something very different from that experience than you would Bloomington.
But Bloomington has
so many reasons to come visit. And that's really attractive for conventions. And so we think of ourselves
as many different things. But I think sometimes those of us who live here forget that we are a favorite
place to visit for many people in Indiana. And people love to have a reason to come here and spend several
days. So we want to capture their imaginations and invite them to hang out here.
my department's involvement was just to review it architecturally and I think it's a stunning building
so it's going to be a great addition to the downtown area and just generally speaking you know interesting
things don't happen on parking lots they do happen in beautiful buildings and we're trading one for
the other so it's just in that very base level I think it's a good thing for the city.
Thank you. A couple more things that I just forgot to mention. I believe it's on Visit Bloomington's
YouTube page. There is a series called The Hard Hat Videos in which
I believe they're just five minute little short updates on Convention Center progress in terms of the
actual construction of the Convention Center. For the entire history, there is a lovely website that
has been produced by the Capital Improvements Board, who is in charge of the new construction. It's munrocib.com.
On that website, you should be able to find the full history of
the convention center, how it came to be, all the different boards that have been created to create
this new convention center.
Where's my pen? Thank you. There is also a 1% that is dedicated to the public arts that comes from the
fund for the convention center. It's about $500,000. And what that means is I think a lot of people
think that it's for art inside the convention center. The requirement for public art is that it actually
has to have some way that anyone can interact with it, not just people who are going inside of the convention
center. So I believe there are.
in the process of going through the applications for artists who may be the one to bring this beautiful
building to life. Next question. Yes, come on up. Hello. My name.
Can everybody hear me? My name is Liz Peck and I have lived in Bloomington for 25 years. I believe there's
also another group of people in Bloomington that are struggling for housing and that is the group of
retirees that will never be able to afford
to live at Meadowwood and really won't qualify for public housing. So what they're doing mostly now
is living in apartments that nobody can afford here. And it's really taking a toll, even for people
that have had houses and have sold them. And that money can dwindle really quickly.
when you're paying a couple thousand dollars a month for rent. So hope well, my hope for hope well that
it will be an intentional community, which it is, that will have people at all income levels, people
at all ages and professions. My ideal is to have one community after the other like that.
in a city where you can get everything you need within a walking distance of maybe a mile and have your
people that you're close with in the community. So I hope that happens at Hopewell and possibly other
places. But I'd also like to know, are there any plans, I know you're doing very ambitious things, but
are there any plans for nice,
livable, affordable housing for seniors? So I guess that's my question. So I'll take it first. And I
just want to clarify. From what you said, I think you're not asking for assisted living kind of affordable
housing. You are talking about independent living. Yeah.
There will be no discrimination at Hopewell for who can buy those and on the rental units who can rent
them. And really, I mean, I think that we have a great mix there. There are some multi-unit buildings
that probably will be condos, not $2 million condos, more like $150,
That's a ballpark. It depends on, you know, the trim and things like that. The anticipated construction
cost on the smallest owner-occupied home, which is a very modest-sized house, the anticipated construction
cost, last I heard, and David can correct me, is $125,000.
And that's a studio. It's a 600 square foot studio, but you could buy it. And so this would be a good
option. It's all on one floor. It's a good option for a senior, but it's also a great option for a younger
person who wants to enter the ownership market, but can't possibly afford to save for a down payment
for a $250,000 house, right?
And so as David said earlier, what we know about who actually lives in houses is that most of them are
one and two person households. But we really don't have anything on the market that is speaking to that
size household. And while many people love to have a guest room or something like that,
Most people really, ultimately, want to live close to work. And they want to live close to the resources.
And so building a more modest-sized home that people can actually get into and stay in is more of our
goal. So that's been the target at Hopewell. I think we probably will attract a lot of seniors there.
I hope we also attract a lot of young professionals.
and that it's a place that everybody in between gets to live to. That is the definition, really, of
a healthy community, is when we can co-locate and have people that don't look exactly like us, that
don't make the exact same income, don't have the exact same interests. We need many gifts at the table.
And every neighborhood needs many different kinds of people. And I think, you know,
It's early days, but that's what we're targeting at Hopewell. You know, the other end of the spectrum
is like a 2,800 square foot house, something like that. Yeah, something like that, and that'll be something
more like $600,000, right? So you can take any end of the spectrum, but it's gonna be this cool, walkable
neighborhood, and hopefully we're gonna attract a real diversity of folks.
Big part of realizing the ability to age in place, I think, is filling out the roster of diverse housing.
Right now, we have a lot of houses of medium to large size, and we have a lot of big student apartment
buildings. We don't have a lot of things that would cater to the senior community. And I think Hopewell
is going to stand as a very conspicuous
again, pilot project, but I think it's really going to be extremely popular, and we're going to see
types of housing that hadn't really been built in Bloomington since almost 100 years ago. We're going
to make it easier to build smaller houses on smaller lots. Seniors don't necessarily need a lot of house.
They definitely don't need a lot of yard. Traditionally, zoning ordinances require minimum square footage
for homes and then a minimum size for a yard, depending on your zoning district.
But it's just really a lot of superfluous area that's just not efficiently used so we can make better
efficient use of the land in the city, it's infill, infill development. Just, you know, every little
thing we can do to maximize efficiency, make ADUs, accessory dwelling units, more easy to build, either
as standalone structures or attached to existing dwellings.
Yeah, there's a lot. You know, Bloomington doesn't have a lot of room to build more and more subdivisions.
You know, we've been doing that now for 60 years, and we've kind of filled it all, with the exception
of Hopewell and Summit and a couple other places. But there is a lot of opportunity to just find small pieces
you know, the side yards, large yards that the owner is interested in subdividing, make it easier to
build, to develop new, or to create new buildable area. And then to, you know, using, obviously you're
in the city, so the pipes are there, the services are there, the streets are there, you're not building
any new infrastructure. So it's really an economical way to try to expand your housing roster. But we
are seeing, I mean, for seniors for sure, smaller is better, but smaller is not
what always gets built. We want to make that as easy as possible. I just need to give a shout out to
Director Hiddle because he has been leading us into a process where we are going to be considering some
amendments to our zoning ordinance. He has led some very effective sessions in neighborhoods and co-led
sessions with council members.
on what do we want? What kind of housing do we need? And this is a shout out for everybody in the room,
but also anybody listening at home. If you have thoughts on how we can do housing better, especially
if you're advocating for more modest-sized lots, more modest-sized places that you can own or rent in
an affordable way,
Even after Hopewell passes through the ordinance process, we'll still be talking about zoning. And it's
really important that we have your voices at the table. Because we need all kinds of voices at the table.
And frequently what happens is only the people who are really upset about something come.
And so we're working really hard to co-create the best solutions we can for residential zoning in our
community. And David takes his work really seriously of listening and really discerning what sounds
like options that people
need and will fit well with the bulk of the fabric in our community. So, you know, I know meetings can
be long. Your letters are appreciated. Your voices at the table are really appreciated. And especially
anyone who may be listening that already has the housing that they love.
it's important to come and say, you know, this is what fits me and I hope we have more of that. So this
is just a general shout out to stay involved. You came to a town hall, we're really grateful to have
you here and we need voices advocating for all kinds of different housing.
Thank you. I think they really got it covered on the policy side. But I do just want to speak to what
Liz said about having a neighborhood that is full of people of different socioeconomic backgrounds,
but also ages. I'm 23. I am a young professional. And I love living in Bloomington. But one of the reasons
I love living in Bloomington is because of all of the intergenerational connections that I've been able
to form. And I really think that that was one of the main things that made me sit back and say,
you know what, Bloomington is.
home and it wasn't because I had a bunch of friends also in a transient portion of our lives where it
does feel very out of stasis and so to have formed all of these intergenerational connections
with Millennials and Gen X and Boomers and the Silent Generation like that has really been what formed
my roots here and so I think that the more that we can bring young professionals with
other generations in the same neighborhoods, the better we can really build that community that we're
looking to build. So thank you for bringing that up. Who else wants to turn at the mic? Steve,
come on up. Okay, my question is, you said something, somebody said something earlier about
and Hopewell. So I'm wondering how that's going to work. If I was going to buy a house in Hopewell,
would I be buying it from the city? Would I be buying it from the contractor that builds it? Or would
I be buying it from some development company that will work with contractors? Does that make sense?
Because I haven't heard anything about that. You haven't heard anything about it because we haven't
worked out those details yet.
But the concept at Hopewell is that we will be training a group of builders to build in this way with
these set plans. So we will be approving a set of plans that go with Hopewell. And so the way construction
usually works is the builder builds the house and you buy it from them. Sometimes that's like a spec
house, sometimes
You buy the lot and engage a builder. You take out a construction loan. So I think there's a lot of
possibilities. I think we still have to work on what's going to work best so that we can market the
lots and get them to the people that need them. We're also going to have a financing training for people
who are bankers and how to
how these loans might need to work and any creativity to make sure we make them as accessible as possible
to folks. So we'll take input about what works best if you're interested. Yeah, you can come on up.
Nobody else is rushing for the microphone. Well, it's just that it's the same topic. Whoops. So I just
wanted to know, I've been a long time patient at CenterStone.
and nobody there seems to kind of have any idea of what all of Hopewell is gonna mean on Centerstone.
Are they gonna stay there? Are they relocating? So yeah, I don't know if you all have any input on that
or any thoughts on that. Yes. My understanding is that I won't speak for Centerstone, but that's
Centerstone's lot. So my understanding is that that's their lot and that they are staying, but they
haven't told us anything else.
And so we anticipate that that service will remain where it is. Yeah Daniel So on that and it might
have been related to the other questions the details may not be worked out But what I've seen a lot
and heard from people is developers out of town out of state will buy up some cheap housing and
and either turn it over into rentals, or they'll tear down sections and rebuild on it. Obviously, Hopewell's
gonna be super nosed, that won't happen. But is there gonna be any guidelines, or I don't know if it's
even legally possible, and I get that, but I'm just curious what would keep someone from coming in and
buying a bunch of only $125,000. Some of those developers can buy dozens of those at a time, and they
can buy much larger, a lot of other houses in downtown. So I was just curious,
and I don't know if that's even been discussed or developed yet, so. Yeah, so we're working on some
different tools to make sure, you know, the intent of Hopewell is not that we have folks buying houses
to come in for a few football weekends or to invest and make money off of them. The intent of Hopewell
is to provide housing for people who work here.
or have lived here long-term. I'm not discriminating against folks that are happily retired. But we
want the long-time residents to have a place that they can attainably have for a long time and that
lives like a neighborhood, an active neighborhood that has neighbors that actually live there. So we're
working on a few different tools to make sure that that happens.
Nothing's ever foolproof, I'm sure, but we definitely have our eyes on that, and this is not a development
that we want to be investment property. Hi, everyone. I'm Tim Dwyer. On the topic of housing, I love
these big, grand, ambitious plans. Hope all's super cool. So excited to see what comes of it.
But what is the city doing to promote infill development, especially on parking lots or under-utilized
lots throughout the city? Because you walk by, there's a lot of lots that are vacant or could be something
else. And that maybe seems like a place where zoning might be a factor. But has the city thought about
engaging property owners in intentional redevelopment of our existing spaces? You can go first. I'll go first.
Great question. Sort of on a macro scale, there are seas of parking that are never used in some of our
big box areas. And it's probably a longer term deal, but I think that those really represent great potential
as far as new housing development. And it's infill, again, same pipes, same roads. You're not creating
new infrastructure for that. That's happening in other places.
even not too far away, and I think it can be replicated here on a more finer-grained scale. We want
to be able to allow people, again, to be able to accomplish lot splits, hopefully, perhaps administratively,
without having to go through long processes and turn large lots that perhaps have one house on it into
a series of smaller lots that might have several houses on them.
I think that as far as targeting properties that are underutilized, I don't know that we have initiatives
in place for that. I do know that the city has looked at sort of examining its roster of real estate
holdings and considering what could be put to use for housing. It's not something we've done yet, but
it's definitely something on the horizon.
But yeah, you know, a big focus is that opportunity for finer-grained, wiser use of land. So you're
barking up the right tree. So two things. You know, I used to be part of my job to scout out these lots
that we might put a house on for habitat. And so, I can tell you they're few and far between that are...
are underutilized and somebody's open to talking about it. I've really spent a good deal of my life
knocking on doors and going down to the courthouse and figuring out who really owns this and calling
folks out of town saying, this abandoned property could be cleaned up and we'll buy it. So I know that
work has been being done.
There are various reasons people may not want something on their lot. But that doesn't mean somebody
couldn't take it up as a project again or still. And I don't know, for instance, if Habitat has a recent
inventory of all the infill lots that might be available. But on that note, I think one of the things
I'm really excited about, about the whole process with Hopewell,
is that once we get these plans approved, our intent is to fast-track them for approval throughout the
city. There are houses that have been designed with Bloomington's sort of architecture in mind. There
will be some very modest size as well as other. And, you know, we are aware that the faster you can
get through the permitting process, frequently, the more affordable your house
can be. It's not a direct correlation, but a long planning process does usually add expense. So we're
hopeful that we're helping with these plans for Hopewell. And these lot split possibilities, I think,
will really benefit folks. One of the things I want to make sure people understand is that what we're
hearing from folks is that
People have considered building ADUs so that they can rent an ADU to another household. And because
they're all on the same lot, you have to remortgage your whole house unless you have cash to pay for
it. But if you could get a lot split for that ADU, then you could get a mortgage just for that ADU.
And so folks who may be aging in place and want a little extra income, or they have a child in town
who's not a child anymore, and they want to live in an ADU on that property, or we want to have a young
professional, those aren't being built for a number of reasons. But one of them is because the financing
is really tricky. And if you don't have a standalone lot, you can't get a standalone mortgage.
Okay, well, I promised to try to get us out of here by 645, and I did get a little buzz on my phone
that we have a weather travel advisory coming in. I just want to note that we do these traveling town
halls every other month, and so this is December, so our next one should be in February, I believe.
They rotate into the different districts. You don't have to live in the district to come to that town
hall. We welcome everyone.
I also have traveling office hours in the months that I don't have a town hall and so you're welcome
to come if you have a topic that you don't want to talk about in a public meeting and you need a full
focus of the Mayor one-on-one. You can sign up for those traveling office hours ahead of time so you
don't just stand in line hoping you get a turn. You have an actual appointment time. And I know our
Planning Department and Councilmember Zulek are always open to connections. So thank you all for braving
the snow tonight and for asking great questions. It's been really great to be with you all and hear
what you're interested in.
Have a great and safe night.